At its most fundamental, a right is the ability to do something with legitimacy, which is conferred legislatively (by a law or regulation, or by a constitution).

Without a governmental authority, you don't need rights. You just do what you're going to do and if someone wants to prevent you from doing it, then you're in conflict. This is why we legislate rights: in order to impose some structure on human actions to provide for settling conflicts.

Like many important concepts, it's not entirely that simple because rights can conflict. Good legislators attempt to foresee such potential conflicts and account for them. When the answer isn't clear, a good legislature has provided for conflict resolution through adjudication or negotiation or arbitration, the result of such proceedings being final (in the end, if there's an appeals process).

@Unseen. My initial thoughts, which may change without notice, are that rights are a lot like morality. Christians claim rights are "endowed by the Creator" just like right and wrong comes from the cosmic lawgiver. There can be "rights" without God just like there can be "right" without god.

Or more specifically, it seems like there are rights that people should have. Since I think we'd all agree that slavery is wrong or burning people for heresy is wrong, then we can all say the right to be free and the right to worship as you choose are good. Therefore, rights feel like morality, in a way, so my brain didn't quite wrap around what you said about rights being legislated, not natural.

I think it's true there are rights I want people to have, and we should legislate them. I don't like slavery or burning people at the stake, but that's today. It was acceptable in other times. Perhaps we've evolved since then and we feel we're better from the perspective of today but the notion that such beliefs are relative to the culture of a time and place is pretty hard to escape.